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White House rolls out sequester specifics

The White House is trying to show how sequester threatens teachers and health programs. | AP and Reuters

National Economic Council Principal Deputy Director Jason Furman told reporters on Sunday’s conference call that teacher jobs are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to sequestration’s state-by-state impact.

“This will have macroeconomic consequences, cost hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country and jobs throughout the private sector,” Furman said. “This will have serious programmatic consequences for all 50 states and the District of Columbia.”

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He added that a balanced approach to reducing the federal deficit through tax and entitlement reform is ideal. Obama’s New Year’s proposal is still on the table, but the White House is also open to a temporary stopgap measure to avert the sequester’s impacts.

“Obviously, that’s not something that could be done in the next five days, which is why the president, Sen. [Harry] Reid, other Democrats are pushing a balanced approach to buy more time to do something that would be much more meaningful economic policy,” Furman said.

That last-ditch effort to avoid sequester is the best option at this point, Pfeiffer said, adding that Republicans haven’t introduced their own measure to avoid sequester during this legislative session.

“The House of Representatives, despite talking points to the contrary, has not acted to solve the sequester in this Congress,” Pfeiffer said. “They passed it last Congress, that bill is expired.”

Democrats like to emphasize that Republicans haven’t acted “this Congress,” but House Republicans twice passed sequestration avoidance bills in the 112th Congress that Senate Democrats did not take up.

Now that Democrats want to act this week, they’ll have to advance their plan through Congress without being outmaneuvered by Republicans.

“Our hope is Republicans don’t use a legislative tactic like the filibuster to block that solution from heading to the House of Representatives,” Pfeiffer said.

But there are already signs of trouble — Ayotte said Sunday that she and her fellow Republicans are planning to introduce their own sequester-avoidance effort this week, saying the Democratic plan relies too heavily on tax increases.

“It seems like the first thing they come up with is, we’re going to raise taxes,” she said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “This notion of giving the president the discretion to make the spending cuts, I think that’s a cop-out. So I will be urging my colleagues to have an alternative and for us to present one.”

Whatever happens in Congress, both parties seem to be putting as much effort into tarring the other with responsibility for sequestration as they are in delaying or voiding it. On the White House conference call, Pfeiffer tried both.

“The president’s an eternal optimist,” he said. “He’s hopeful the Republicans will listen to the overwhelming opinion of the American people and come to some compromise here in the closing days.”